BACKGROUND
In the inland region of Itigi in central Tanzania, the drought has persisted for many months.
Leprosy has been declared defeated in Tanzania for many years now. Lepers had been gathered in small communities, partly to be able to cure them, but also to stem the disease.
Eventually, these communities have turned into ghettos.
One is located in Sukamahela.
An unknown number of lepers have been living here for years now. Isolated from stigma and superstition, with no employment, subsidies, or the possibility of supporting themselves, they struggle to move in the wide and sunburned spaces, on the red earth.
The disease is stable, thanks to the small dispensary, but it took its tolls.
Many are nearly blind, with no fingers or toes. They have difficulty walking, taking objects, living a normal existence.
The Ursuline sisters take care of them, distributing every day their only meal.
HISTORY
I photographed the community when meals, consisting of rice and beans pudding, are distributed. Around noon, the lepers leave their houses and slowly, dragging buckets and containers of various kinds, they move to the kitchens.
They sit on the porch to shelter from the sun, and have a chat.
They calmly wait for their turn. The sisters fill the buckets.
And at last they go back to their homes, to eat their meal alone.
- When 2017
- Where Sukamahela, Tanzania
